Marathon Man
Marathon Man (1976)
Director: John Schlesinger
Cast: Dustin Hoffman, Laurence Olivier, Roy Scheider, William Devane, Marthe Keller
In the 70 years the memory of World War II still remained very much alive in popular memory. Many Nazi criminals were unaccounted for since the apocalypse of the Third Reich and were supposed to lead a hidden life, which man among us agazapados sack waiting to asestarte any chance for a new zarpazo, especially if you were Jewish. The novelist William Goldman channeled that common sense to shape a novel whose film rights were purchased by the producer Robert Evans, creating one of the film capital of the decade.
Could be a lot of stress Marathon Man, but if anything stands out in particular is the presence of a god: Laurence Olivier. Today many will still revered as the best British player has ever stepped on a theater stage, and few are bringing this claim to movie sets. But when they agreed to participate in the film, Olivier for several years with little power to work seriously ill with cancer, gout, suffering aches thousand more men could hardly be in place, and few believed they would finish filming alive to the point that no insurance company refused to sign the usual policy to cover risks during filming. However, the legendary actor surprised everyone by his integrity, pulling caste, stoicism and courage to overcome the ills that harass, and achieving a more noticeable in a role that he had enjoyed when it was offered . Marathon Man was like a balm for him and cancer, gout and many aches sent. Finally living up to 1989, then appeared in many other films.
Much has been spoken of the relationship with the actor Laurence Olivier, Dustin Hoffman and a then as a star and established a reputation for being one of the best American actors of his generation. Over the years many have spread rumors and anecdotes about the alleged rivalry between them that emerged during the shooting of the film. While it is true that Olivier used by Hoffman to get their particular methods of achieving a convincing (eg put a pebble in the shoe to simulate lameness in Midnight Cowboy), the reality is that the British actor did more than anything cachondeo since then he himself started laughing remembering how, being young, the skin is played daily to give more credibility to their interpretations of Shakespeare in the theater. The relationship between the two became very close to the point that in any interview, the better for it to Dustin excited recalling his experiences with the legendary English actor, which is surprising for a person who accuse them of bad language have a rotten pelín. Deserves mention Marthe Keller, who showed that Toshiro Mifune was not the only person capable of learning a phonetic script, the actress, of Swiss origin, had no idea puñetera English when he arrived in September of shooting and recited their sentences vocalizing memory, without never really understand what they are saying. And do not do anything wrong.
Worthwhile to devote part of our free time to watch Marathon Man, a small tape that he won a place in the super welter of that style by that time in Hollywood, surrounded by a decisive moment in its history (one year before Sharks debut was released, and then make a Star Wars), and that dwarfed the success we have had at the time, relegating almost forgotten. A good script, surprising and memorable scenes like the duel between the Jew "Babe" Levy and ruthless Nazi torturer Szell, a division of bells and all bonded by a director who knew how to make the most of what I had in hand, can not result in anything other than a good film. And Marathon Man is.
